All hands on deck for waterways system

Maintaining nation's outdated inland waterways system is in our best interest.

Copyright 2013: Houston Chronicle |
April 26, 2013

That pretty well sums up the layperson's view of the country's extensive inland waterways system, an efficient, environmentally friendly network of rivers, locks and canals that moves our huge fleet of floating pack mules, aka barges, powered by towboats.

And what gets moved?

Let's take Texas: The 400 miles of the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway connects Houston with ports from Beaumont to Brownsville.

In 2011, commodities from coal to grain, aggregate and iron ore to chemicals and crude petroleum totaling nearly 20 million tons moved through the system. The dollar value of these goods was nearly $70 billion, according to statistics from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

This is a big deal, and likely to get much bigger with the expansion of the Panama Canal and the expected return of traditional manufacturing to areas such as the Upper Midwest, thanks in no small part to the shale gas boom.

This likelihood makes the sorry state of the inland water system a matter of urgency. The system received a D- grade this year on the annual report card put out by the American Society of Civil Engineers, and not for the first time.

What does D- mean? The system is replete with locks and dams and other infrastructure that have far outlived their expected design life. And that translates into delays and added costs for both industry and consumers. Houston, this is a problem.

While barges are associated in the public mind mostly with the nation's great rivers, the deterioration of the system also has a direct impact on our port, and more specifically on industries up and down the Ship Channel that rely on barges for the efficient transiting of products and supplies required to make them.

Oh yes, and this important side benefit for Houston: The product shipped by three barges means 450 fewer trucks on the road. Given that for every ship that moves into the Houston Ship Channel, there are five or six barges transiting, that figures as a substantial contribution to cleaner air and reduced highway congestion in this area.

So we think the system needs priority attention. But we can't make this case in support of fixing up our inland waterways system without mentioning a situation that has busted budgets and delayed planned improvements to the system in a significant way.

A decision by the federal government to use a method known as "in the wet" construction to build a dam on the Ohio River resulted in a staggering cost overrun. The Olmsted Dam project was expected to be built for $775 million in 10 years' time is now expected to cost taxpayers and the barge industry more than $3 billion - and is still not finished.

Where is the outrage? What assurance do taxpayers have that this will not happen again? We're all paying for this in countless ways with no apparent end in sight.

Meanwhile, barge traffic in this hub area continues to use two nearby dams built in the 1920s, causing bottlenecks and delays. And so, there appears to be no alternative to completing the project.

The sensible way forward would seem to involve two important changes in the way inland waterways budgets are set and the dollars disbursed. Like NASA, but on a much smaller scale, the inland waterways budget needs to be removed from the political cycle that creates stops and starts and wasted time and materials as projects are reviewed and rated and budgets are altered without adequate consideration for strategic objectives. A 10-year project should not be held hostage to year-to-year changes in budgeting.

The other issue is pork. Having Congress involved in the budgeting process means that every representative involved needs to bring home something to show constituents. One way out would be to place these decisions in the hands of an independent commission, similar to the one created to decide on military base closings.

For its part, the barge industry should follow through on its commitment to increase the amount it pays in a user fee from 20 cents per gallon of diesel fuel to 26-29 cents per gallon. At this point, it's all hands on deck to maintain and modernize this important transportation asset.